The drug dealers were here, but they're gone now, said Capital Hotel co-owner Maurice Byblow, while sitting in its bar on Monday afternoon. The only problem is, when the dealers left in August, they took more than half of Byblow's business with them. "My business has been severely hurt by their absence, but I'm not concerned because I prefer the different crowd and the different image." Byblow has co-owned the Main Street bar for nine years. His partners in the venture include Energy, Mines and Resources Minister Archie Lang, Deborah Fulmer and Ken Eby. All four sit as directors of the Whitehorse Cattle Co. Ltd., a holding company that owns the Capital Hotel. [continues 666 words]
The Yukon government will provide the RCMP with $1.4 million over the next three years to establish a street crime reduction team. "Our government's priority is to respond to Yukoners' concerns about substance abuse, its causes and effects," Justice Minister Marion Horne told reporters this morning. The initiative is part of the territorial government's Substance Abuse Action Plan. It will receive $485,000 annually and will be focused on addressing drug and alcohol crimes on the streets of Whitehorse and other Yukon communities. [continues 273 words]
The Safer Communities and Neighbourhoods (SCAN) office will opening Wednesday and begin to take complaints from Yukoners. "Together, we can put a stop to these threats," Justice Minister Marion Horne told a news conference this morning in Whitehorse. "We are pleased to respond to the needs of citizens with legislation that empowers them to take back the safety of their neighbourhoods." The legislation that created the office passed through the house last spring. It targets properties being used for producing, growing, selling or using illegal drugs, prostitution, solvent abuse and the unlawful sale or consumption of alcohol. [continues 556 words]
Needles. They're a nightmare for kids and irritant for adults. But a needle from a doctor is entirely different from a used drug needle hiding like a snake in the grass where children may play. It's a hard problem to solve entirely and Whitehorse does better than most, said Becky Huston, a health promotion worker with Blood Ties Four Directions Centre. The centre operates a needle exchange program aimed at reducing the transmission of HIV and Hepatitis C. "We basically provide all the equipment that could transmit HIV or Hep C," she said. Besides needles, the centre gives users sterile water, cotton balls, tourniquets and needle disposal boxes. [continues 831 words]
Frying eggs in skillets and proclaiming the brain sizzles while smoking drugs never convinced a kid not to smoke a joint. So with school back in session, addiction counsellors are back in Whitehorse high schools, trying to help teens navigate the party circuit and its allure of alcohol and drugs by offering simple, honest and accurate information. "You can't lie to teens about drugs," said Dale Gordon, supervisor of treatment and standards at alcohol and drug services in Whitehorse. "If you start using sensational language teenagers know the difference. If you think you're going to scare them into not using drugs, you're wrong." [continues 818 words]
This letter will try to convey the outrage I feel about my experience crossing from Alaska into the Yukon Territory at the border station along the Alaska Highway. The time was about 7 p.m. on July 25. I pulled up to the Canadian customs, where I sat for some minutes while I waited for other persons in front of me in line to move on. My turn came about in a reasonable amount of time. I found myself greeting the cold, female customs official, who started asking me a very long list of questions, as she gave me the "evil eye". As she was trying to stare me down, I could tell right away, she did not like me. [continues 1912 words]
As Porter Creek Secondary School students returned to class Thursday, they might have been disappointed after expecting to be greeted at the school by a puppy. "They certainly were excited about it," Kerry Huff, the school's principal, said in an interview Wednesday. "They're expecting (the dog) to be here." The school received about $250,000 from the territorial government to establish a three-year Dogs for Drug Free Schools pilot program. The approval for the program came after the school council brought up Medicine Hat Police Service Sgt. Randy Youngman, who heads up Dogs for Drug Free Schools in the Alberta community. Youngman brought Fiddler up with him as well, one of two dogs that work with the program there. [continues 247 words]
"Justice is itself the great standing policy of civil society; and any eminent departure from it, under any circumstances, lies under the suspicion of being no policy at all." - - Edmund Burke Dear people responsible for the Canadian criminal justice system, I am writing you today to express my dismay with our nation's and our territory's revolving-door justice system that keeps criminals on the streets and innocent people in fear. As a member of the media and a citizen of Whitehorse, I have a number of concerns over the way justice issues are dealt with in our courts. [continues 485 words]
Re: Canadian sovereignty is gone. U.S. officials had Canadian officers arrest Internet marijuana seed dealer Marc Emery of Vancouver. It seems clear that the U.S. thinks Emery and his seeds are a much bigger threat to the status quo than, say, Osama bin Laden. While police in the U.K. are rounding up Pakistani-born bombing suspects, the U.S. is rounding up Canadian-born marijuana-law-reform activists. When they searched the home and business of Mr. Emery, by the way, they failed to find any weapons of mass destruction, or Osama. [continues 270 words]
Whatever you do, don't go to Google and type in "industrial hemp". If you do, Big Oil will be very mad at you! The oil industry would be really upset if the media let the general public know we could entirely replace crude oil - a finite commodity - with a clean-burning, easy-growing, cheaply-processed, endlessly-renewable plant material. They would be absolutely furious if all of us - who are entirely dependent on them - were to suddenly find out that hemp has 25,000 industrial applications, including car fuel, polymers (plastic), food, fibre, medicine, building materials and paper. [continues 88 words]
There have been a couple of articles published in the past couple of months about the negative effects of marijuana use and how it should be banned completely. While I agree that the harder drugs - cocaine, crack, ecstasy and the like - do not have a place in our society, marijuana may be the exception to the rule (and there are always exceptions to the rule). The effects of marijuana use are quite parallel to those of alcohol. They are both addictive, result in similar physical impairments, and can cause health risks if ingested in large amounts. [continues 96 words]
The number of women using Whitehorse's alcohol and drug detoxification facility has skyrocketed, according to the facility's supervisor. Recently compiled data shows a 23-per-cent increase in the number of women dropping into the centre since 2001, said detox supervisor Val Osinchuk during a recent tour provided to The News. "In the past, we'd be lucky to see one or two women in an entire month," she said. "Now they make up around one-fifth of our clients." [continues 607 words]
There is an element of ambiguity in the tales of brutal Outside drug dealers ruling Whitehorse streets. The group of 60 young people who asked a drug dealer to leave the Capital Hotel two weeks ago are being vaunted as heroes, and with some justification. And Danika McKenna, a 20-year-old woman who bravely stepped forward to oversee Saturday's anti-drug rally at Rotary Peace Park, defines the word "activist." But stories of thugs beating people with Louisville Sluggers for innocently being in the wrong place at the wrong time, often don't quite add up. [continues 474 words]
The Downtown Residents Association is applauding a group of young people that confronted drug dealers in Whitehorse last week. And the group is hoping the resulting publicity will ratchet up pressure on the Yukon government to enforce the Safer Communities and Neighbourhoods Act. "We're really supporting the youth demonstration," said association president John Pattimore at a news conference Monday. "We called this to show support for the youth," added association board member, and local reporter, Roxanne Livingstone. "They gathered to send a message that drug dealers are not welcome, and that's a message we endorse," said Livingstone at the conference, held near a well-known drug house on Wheeler Street. [continues 1009 words]
Whoever is in support of getting these guys the hell out of our town please join me in applause," screamed 20-year-old Danika McKenna. On cue about 175 people who gathered Saturday at Rotary Peace Park on Saturday to stand with McKenna and other young people against drugs and violence erupted into applause. "There are people standing among you who are going to report who has said what," added McKenna, as a group of mostly adults looked on. "We need to keep our eyes on each other. And if everyone wants to keep their eyes on me, that would be great." [continues 1199 words]
Canada is a big country, with a lot of diversity, but there are indeed many cultural strings binding us together. Who would have thought vigilante justice would be one of them? Last week in Whitehorse a group of 50 people, mostly young men, some armed with clubs and blades, exercised their power by exorcising a suspected drug dealer from a local bar. Although they carried weapons, their actions were non-violent. The group that assembled on Wednesday and Thursday "wasn't like a violent mob," said one activist, who asked to remain nameless because he fears for his safety. [continues 439 words]
A Copper Ridge resident found a poster Thursday showing two photos of reputed drug dealers under the title "Drug Dealers At Work Outside the 202". Organizers of tomorrow afternoon's Rotary Peace Park rally say the posters have nothing to do with their group and no one has come forward to claim responsibility for the posters. The posters appeared on Granger subdivision mailboxes. Some had been taken down by today. They showed one picture of four men outside the 202 bar and one picture of a single man outside a convenience store. They also had a short list of licence plate numbers and addresses. [continues 721 words]
Sgt. Guy Rook has answered some tough questions about the RCMP's efforts to control drugs and violence in downtown Whitehorse. "It's very important to us that people feel safe," he said in an interview today when told many Whitehorse residents are afraid of drug dealers and the organized crime groups behind them. When it was suggested many drug dealers operate fairly openly and with little concern about police, Rook responded by saying, "Tell us about them. "The activity that surrounds drugs that's visible is something that we are glad the public comes to us and tells us about," he said. [continues 492 words]
While trying to temper a response to what he said may or may not be vigilanteism, Premier Dennis Fentie has only one message for the city's drug dealers: "Saddle up and get the hell out of the Yukon!" Responding to questions from the Star Friday afternoon, Fentie said he's been watching the anti-drug/violence protests in the city with great interest. He said he supports the move to kick drug pushers out of Whitehorse and the territory but cannot condone people taking the law into their own hands. [continues 818 words]
This is an open letter to all the residents of Whitehorse and the surrounding communities. There has been a lot of coverage lately on the violence surrounding the drug activity and certain people involved as of late. There has been a group of Yukoners who have together to stand up and try to put an end to the violence. Many things have been said and have been written about the going on as of late. Stories get exaggerated and sometimes the truth can be twisted. [continues 435 words]
Inside Yukon Territory
